The Lynching Quizzes

The Lynching Quiz

1 In what year was "The Lynching" first published?
1921

1919

1920

1917
2 How can we best describe the function of the poem's form?
As a critique of America's perverse love of lynching

As a report on the specifics of a particular case

As a plea asking God to intervene

As a prayer for the victim of the lynching
3 What Christian concept does the phrase "awful sin" refer to?
Venial sin

Original sin

Divine intervention

Eternal sin
4 What color are the women's "steely" eyes in line 12?
Brown

The poem does not say

Green

Blue
5 What word does McKay rather surprisingly not capitalize?
Spirit

Fate

Day

Father
6 What is the name of the 1922 collection of McKay's poetry that includes "The Lynching"?
Songs of Protest

Harlem Shadows

Home to Harlem

The Weary Blues
7 What do the children do in the poem's final line?
Stare

Cry

Dance

Run Away
8 What details does the poem tell us about the victim?
The poem tells us his age

The poem does not tell us any details

The poem tells us his profession

The poem tells us where he is from
9 How many similes and metaphors does McKay use in the poem?
Six

Four

None

Two
10 What feature of the "Shakespearean" sonnet form does the poem employ?
An EFEF rhyme scheme in stanza 3

A final rhyming couplet

An ABAB rhyme scheme in stanza 1

A division into octave and sestet
11 What verb does the poem use to describe the women coming to look at the body?
Filed

Gathered

Crowded

Thronged
12 What consonant sound is repeated several times in the opening line?
"T" sound

"B" sound

"N" sound

"S" sound
13 Where are the religious terms located in the poem?
Dispersed throughout the poem

All in the end

Only at the beginning and the end

All in the beginning
14 What is the poetic term for the ABBA, CDDC, and EFFE stanzas that the poem employs?
Envelope stanzas

Mirror stanzas

Folded stanzas

Petrarchan stanzas
15 Which of the following words does McKay NOT use to refer to the victim?
Body

Corpse

Char

Thing
16 What notable formal feature is only used in the poem's third quatrain?
Personification

Apostrophe

Caesura

Enjambment
17 Which of the following poets also wrote a poem entitled "The Lynching"?
Langston Hughes

Anne Spencer

Countee Cullen

Dorothea Mathews
18 What syntactical element—typically common in McKay's poetry—is NOT present in "The Lynching"?
Conjunctions

Exclamation points

Semicolons

Parentheses
19 How does the speaker describe the crowds in line 9?
Steely

Large

White

Mixed
20 What famous star does McKay allude to in the second stanza?
The Dog Star

The Star of David

The North Star

Halley's Comet
21 What does Dorothea Mathew's "The Lynching" have in common with McKay's poem?
A description of stars above the scene

References to animals

A neutral description of the lynch mob

An emphasis on the interiority of the victim
22 What does the "bright and solitary star" ultimately do to the victim?
It commemorates him

It guides him

It gives him up

It comforts him
23 Which of the following is NOT a central theme of the poem?
The dehumanization and objectification of black bodies

Forgiveness of sin

The continuity of racial violence

The incomparable horrors of lynching
24 Which of the following characteristics does "The Lynching" share with McKay's "America"?
Its sense that America's empire will fall

Its radical use of the sonnet form

Its conception of masculinity

Its heavy reliance on figurative language
25 What does "The Lynching" have in common with "If We Must Die"?
Explicit comparisons to inhuman predators and monsters

A trenchant critique of racialized violence

An idealized notion of masculinity

A classical conception of heroism

Are you referring to The Lynching?

Asked by ciara D #1240880

Answered by Aslan on 6/2/2022 4:52 PM

Claude McKay 1889-1948 Lynching

In the year before McKay published "The Lynching," 76 black men and women were lynched, the highest number in 15 years, and records suggest that 4,743 people—3,446 of them black—were lynched between 1882 and 1968, though many lynchings also went...

Asked by Wizyblack W #1155421

Answered by jill d #170087 on 5/31/2021 10:07 AM

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What is the mood

Inthink the mood uses a sense of irony to convey a feeling of horror and tragedy.

Asked by Djimon L #916243

Answered by Aslan on 7/16/2019 3:37 PM

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The Lynching

by Claude McKay

The Lynching Quiz

The Lynching Questions and Answers

Study Guide for The Lynching

Essays for The Lynching